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Regaining our Competitive Edge: A National Blueprint for Prosperity

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What
if the federal government could be an effective partner—setting the
framework for big issues such as transportation and sustainability—in
making metropolitan areas more competitive in this new global economy?

It’s
a big question, posed by Bruce Katz,
that’s at the heart of the Brookings Institution's new initiative,
Blueprint for American Prosperity. The premise? Dynamic global and
domestic forces pose urgent challenges that are testing American
prosperity, says Katz, vice president and director, Metropolitan
Policies at Brookings. To compete, he asserts, the U.S. must leverage
four key assets: innovation, infrastructure, human capital and quality
places. Those assets are concentrated—and this is paramount—in
metropolitan areas.

The problem? The federal government has not
kept up with global changes and is impeding rather than promoting
progress in metro areas.

Not smart.

The Brookings Institution
recently launched the next phase of the Blueprint for American Prosperity:
Unleashing the Potential of a Metropolitan Nation. It’s a bold,
long-term initiative to “reinvigorate” the federal government to
promote the health and vitality of the country’s metropolitan areas.
(Phase One, Katz explains, was selling the concept of a metro nation.)

‘We’re going to attempt to reimagine and redevelop a partnership with a national government that’s been adrift for decades,” Katz says.

“This
is how we think of our country, a nation of 50 states, but it’s
essentially become a network of metro areas, and unless these places
are healthy and vital, our ability to compete globally is at risk. “We
are a metro nation,” says Katz. “It’s time we started acting like it.”

Katz recently sat down for an exclusive interview with Pop City editor Tracy Certo.

Q:
Of the four key assets you say are critical to leverage—innovation,
infrastructure, human capital and quality places-- is there any one
that’s more critical than the other?

A: They’re all critical in
their own right. Success has to be productive growth, inclusive growth,
sustainable growth. You can have a very sustainable place but not be
very inclusive, with big disparities in income or education; you can be
very sustainable but not compete globally.

You’ve got to be
thinking about all four of these things. Depending on your starting
point you might want to emphasize one or the other. If you’re very
productive already --if you’re Seattle, then maybe sustainability is
the issue and however you define sustainability. Talking about quality
of place or urban regeneration may be the most important thing to do.

I tend to want cities and metropolitan areas to think about their challenges in a unified and holistic way rather than operate on multiple paths.

Q: Why hasn’t the federal government kept pace with the changes in the world today? What’s gone wrong?

A: I
think there’s been a philosophy in play since the 1980s that we should
be pushing out responsibility from the federal government. It may be
aligned with Reagan but a lot of democratic leaders have aligned with
this as well.

This notion that power should be pushed out of
Washington crossed party lines and ideological lines. The problem is
the world has changed a bit since 1980: the Internet, globalization,
global warming, wage stagnation. We need to rethink the national
government. We believe we’re not going to return to the federal
government of the 1970s--top down, hierarchical command-control--nor
should we. We need to have a more balanced vision of federalism. The
federal government leads where it must, sets the frame for big success
on climate, wages, and competitiveness but also empowers metros to push
the envelope further.

Q: Are there governments elsewhere in the world doing it right?

A: When
you look to Europe or China or Japan or Korea or Singapore, you find
governments that are leading--they’re leading in ways that as Americans
we probably find intrusive but they are setting goals and aspirations
and aligning policies in support of all those things. So we can learn
from Asia and, especially, Europe on what it means to lead on climate, and infrastructure, what it means to have a first class rather than third class infrastructure, which is what we have.

Because
we’re American --and this is a good thing --we share power more, we
diffuse power more. There are more people involved in making things
happen and that’s why we’re stronger. We’re not waiting for the regs
from some central bureaucracy somewhere. We are the most
entrepreneurial country in part because of our governing system but our
governing system is broken and dysfunctional and needs to be repaired.

Q: What kind of buy-in are you seeking and how’s it going to work?

A: It’s at three levels. The first level is we want people to buy the paradigm of the metro nation.

Q: Is that a tough sell?

A: Very
much so. We’re still Jeffersonian Americans. A large portion of
Americans think we live in small towns and when you say metro, they
think you mean city. Even though they’re living in a town or suburb and
they’re commuting into cities or using the amenities of a city, they
don’t regard themselves as living in a broader metro.

Q: And your definition of a metro is a region with a population over 50,000.

A: Yes,
that's the federal definition. The top 100 metros, which is really what
we focus on, on have a base population of half a million total.
Charleston is #85. Sarasota is 77. Lancaster, PA is in the top 100
metros. Two-thirds of the population are in metros, with three-fourths of the GDP. (gross domestic product)

Q: Back to the original question on how the buy-in is going to work.

A: We
have a whole series of concrete legislatable ideas on innovation, on
infrastructure, on quality of place, and climate. We would like those
to be enacted.

And the last piece, we are building a network of
corporate, civic, and political leaders from metros like Pittsburgh
because we think that metros are less than the sum of their parts
politically—because they’ve never acted to impress their agenda on
either the nation or states. So if we’re successful in that with our
allies and build this network, they can ultimately advocate for these
kinds of changes.

Q: How are you building that network?

A: Through
these large convenings and small convenings; it’s mostly retail, to be
frank. You can’t build a network over the Internet; you need people to
come together.

We will have a group of affiliates from the
major metros from the U.S. so business, universities, environmental,
civic, politics, a group of folks affiliated with this initiative, who
say we agree with the principals of this. They may not agree with every
single policy reform that is being advocated but fundamentally agree
with the notion that we’re a metro nation but we’re not acting like one.

Going forward, what we’ll have is a sort of self-selection process and a bunch
of leadership networks within metros who say this is something we
really want to engage on. What we’re looking for is people who really
want to spend time on this. The big rules have to change.

Q: Are the two presidential candidates addressing this?

A: When
it comes to these areas like innovation, human capital, infrastructure
and climate, they would say they have many ideas along these lines. Do
they accept the notion that we are a metro nation? No. I don’t think
any political candidate would say that because the word metro for a
large portion of the population is something people don’t side with.

I
do expect them to pick up ideas around these areas, these assets that
drive prosperity, to have a bold and ambitious plan in innovation, and
a purposeful plan on infrastructure. I think that’s where they’re
going. That’s victory on some level.

Ultimately, we’re trying to
create a safe place where political leaders can actually say, ‘you know
what, we are organized differently than we were 200 years ago and maybe
that requires more dramatic restructuring in how
we think about our place in the world and how we think about climate
and alleviating poverty.’ That’s in the long run what you want to have
happen. In the short run it’s changing policies.

Q: How does a
city today work on an issue like transportation in conjunction with the
Blueprint on Prosperity? How would it work?

A: A lot of this is
about making choices. There are infrastructure dollars raised by the
federal and state government that are more flexible than people think
that allows for shifts between highway and transit.

The question
is what’s your vision for yourself? ? Is it Mon-Fayette Expressway or
is it transit within the denser core or some alternative? In many
metros we tend to be on autopilot. We still tend to make investments in
infrastructure that serves the 1970s economy as opposed to this economy.

Using
state and federal dollars in advance of visions that are more likely to
have high returns on investment that’s competitive and
sustainable--that’s A.

B--leveraging our private sector and C,
leveraging our prospective tax and revenue enhancements. Because you
build these corridors you can do your land use, you’re going to have
some real revenue enhancements and you can bank those right now. That’s
a smart use of tax increment financing.

Q: Is it too late to get a train system in the United States?

A: Light rail is going to be prevalent in the US. I think the train system will happen in a select group of corridors in the US.
To see all Blueprint for Prosperity policy papers, on issues from a
national innovation foundation to transportation for the 21st Century,
click here.

Note:
The paper on the carbon footprint of the top 100 areas is the first
time anyone has showed how each metro acts vis a vis climate, spatial
landscape, energy sources, and its rules. To see how Pittsburgh and
other metros fare, click here.